Margaret Hamburg recently forfeited her title as commissioner for the FDA after 6 years of serving – one of the longest runs in recent decades. So what do you have to say about the six year tenure of Dr. Margaret Hamburg as Commissioner of the U.S. Food and Drug Administration? Maybe if we look at a couple of aspects from the mandate of the FDA, we can more accurately come up with a grade on her performance as she departs. According to the FDA’s website, its mandate is as follows.
“FDA is responsible for protecting the public health by assuring the safety, efficacy and security of human and veterinary drugs, biological products, medical devices, our nation’s food supply, cosmetics, and products that emit radiation.
FDA is also responsible for advancing the public health by helping to speed innovations that make medicines more effective, safer, and more affordable and by helping the public get the accurate, science-based information they need to use medicines and foods to maintain and improve their health. FDA also has responsibility for regulating the manufacturing, marketing and distribution of tobacco products to protect the public health and to reduce tobacco use by minors.
Finally, FDA plays a significant role in the Nation’s counterterrorism capability. FDA fulfills this responsibility by ensuring the security of the food supply and by fostering development of medical products to respond to deliberate and naturally emerging public health threats.”
1. Margaret Pushes Pharmaceuticals and Big Pharma Ties
When Dr. Hamburg was confirmed as Commissioner in 2009, hopes were that because of her public health background, she would take steps away from total commitment to drugs as the only sanctioned health remedy. But she quickly moved to show this was not in her plans. Her years at the FDA have been devoted to advancing prescription drugs.
Roughly 100 Americans die from prescription drug use every day, and the rise in fatalities during the last several years is astonishing. Statistics from 2010 show that 38,329 people in the US died from prescription drugs that year, up from 16,849 observed in 1999. In 2013, that number was 22,767, revealing statistical variation rather than a downward spiral in death rates.
The FDA’s activity is seen by some as equivalent to dropping an atom bomb on each USA city every year due to its blatant endorsement of pharmaceutical drugs and food additives. At the same time, the FDA has banned many safe and effective natural remedies.
Little has been done to harness drug industry corruption as it has reached outrageous proportions in the last six years. In fact, Commissioner Hamburg’s FDA proposed the elimination of one of the few pseudo-effective measures that restrict the agency from simply rubber stamping all drug approvals – by pushing for the elimination of conflict of interest laws and a green light to fill advisory positions with paid drug company shills.
In 2013, Hamburg led the surge to fast-track more types of pharmaceutical drugs. Fast tracking is nothing more than a way to get around safeguards already in place and to start making more money faster regardless of the consequences for those who take those drugs. Reports noted that the FDA planned to allow certain obesity drugs, antibiotics, and others to be foisted onto the masses without undergoing appropriate regulatory review.
2. Natural Health, Raw Milk Vigorously Attacked
Meanwhile, such biological products as vitamins, minerals, and herbs haven’t killed a single person for many years. But during Hamburg’s reign at the FDA, she presided over several acts of domestic terrorism against people who produced and sold dietary supplements and raw milk, and practiced natural health. There is an ongoing effort to regulate them out of existence.
The replacement of the food provided for us and underwritten by nature has continued under Hamburg’s reign with the approval of unwanted and inadequately tested genetically modified alfalfa, salmon, and apples, among other GMO foods.
3. GMO Foods Forced onto the Public
Knowing that public opposition to unleashing genetically modified salmon into the environment was great, the FDA pulled a fast one in late December 2012 when most people were distracted with holiday happenings. They advanced the approved GM salmon when few were paying attention.
In spite of the fact that most people are overwhelmingly in favor of GMO labeling laws, the FDA refuses to budge in its stance that labeling is unnecessary. This is in the face of lawmakers and advocates that cite health concerns.
4. Refusing to Truly Act on Antibiotics in Livestock and Other Food Issues
In 2012, the FDA refused to ban antibiotics in livestock, saying any phase out would have to be voluntary. This move has helped to spawn the rise of antibiotic-resistant bacteria, leaving the population, which as a group does not generally know much about natural alternatives, with little in the way of drug remedies for bacterial infection.
Hamburg has used outbreaks of food borne illness as a chance to extend FDA power. After the egg recall in 2010, she said her organization’s power is limited to reacting when an outbreak occurs. She called on Congress to pass legislation that would provide a more “preventive approach.” You can look at the heat gassing of almonds and the resulting loss of much of their nutritional value as a protocol for what this preventive approach would be.
Just like most of the members of the medical establishment, Hamburg fosters the belief that all food is the same except for its caloric value, meaning that in her world a half cup of Cool Whip has the same food value as an amount of blueberries with the equivalent calorie value. Although her high intelligence and good health suggest she knows this is not true, she advocates for the masses to believe it.
Less than six months after the first reports on the tragic BP oil spill in the Gulf, Hamburg’s FDA joined with the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration to state categorically that all Gulf seafood was safe to eat. This was while independent tests were showing the waters were still highly contaminated, and sea creatures were dying from exposure to oil and the toxic dispersant used in trying to break it up.
A Glimpse into Hamburg’s Character
Although Margaret Hamburg received her salary as FDA Commissioner from the American tax payers, she and her father Dr. David A. Hamburg are members of the Council on Foreign Relations, a power-politic organization seeking to undermine the sovereignty of the US and implement a new world order.
In 2008 Charlie Brown, National Counsel for Consumers for Dental Choice, sued the FDA for its failure to classify mercury amalgam, as it had been directed to do since 1976 when it was determined that all medical devices needed to be classified.
Why hadn’t amalgam been classified? Because the FDA would have had to tell Americans that amalgam is mostly mercury, and then nobody would want it in their mouth, ruining the dental industry and Henry Schein, the largest seller of dental products including mercury amalgam.
Here’s a classic example of the revolving door through which insiders bounce between well-paid positions in industry to high-ranking FDA positions that regulate those industries. Just before coming to the FDA, Hamburg was on the board of Henry Schein. She came straight to the FDA with this huge conflict of interest. When she became FDA Commissioner, she had to sign an ethics contract saying she would sell her Henry Schein stock and not participate in any matters affecting the company as long as she owned stock or stock options in the company.
But after she signed her contract and was approved for the FDA, she did not recuse herself from working on the amalgam rule and she continued to hold stock options in Henry Schein. While she was holding those options, she and another Schein employee created a scheme to cover up the fact that the company was selling amalgam containing mercury.
So goodbye to you, Commission Hamburg, and being the naturally healthy people that we are, we wish you well. Please don’t slam the door on the way out.
Additional Sources:
Politico
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